Ash: A Bad Boy Romance (11 page)

I’ve put it off for a long, long time, but it’s time for me to move on from getting clean and building a gym that failed. That shit is painful. Putting together a new gym—a new life—that’s what I can put at the center of my life. And along the way, I’ll be convincing Summer that I’m not the same man who broke her heart and left her, sobbing and lugging her suitcase onto a bus bound for North Carolina.

Come to think of it, I never
was
that man. I made up ugly lies so she’d go her own way without me.

And here she is, poised on the precipice of giving me a chance again. I knew I wouldn’t blame her if she didn’t, but here we are. The money I have saved from years of toiling for Frank, from the grueling battle of getting myself sober and ugly defeats with Josh when he was still drinking—it’s time to put it to good use.
 

“I’ve been thinking,” I shout at Josh when he leaps out of the fighting cage and rushes over to me, sweating hard from pushing himself. “We need to put a down payment on that place by October 31st. You in? It’s a big fucking chance to take but—”

“Yeah, I’m in. Natalie is coming back at the end of the month.” He shrugs. “Big fight right before that. I’ll win it.” He shrugs. “You keep your money, Ash. I’ve got it taken care of for the down payment.”

“Sure you do, Joshie.”
 

I clap the kid on the back before he goes off to the barely functioning showers. There’s a fifty-fifty chance he’ll win the fight—and an even bigger chance we won’t be able to cover the money needed for repairs on the place we want to buy. But Josh is the only family I’ve got down here—besides Summer, and she’s just barely interested in giving me a chance right now.
 

Standing alone in my defunct gym that no one comes to anymore—as a result of my own shitty management and Frank’s vendetta against any other fighting business in a hundred mile radius—I’m a bit nostalgic for New York.

Cullen might be mostly a psychopath, but since his own mother was killed at the whim of an old mafia boss, he
never
messed with family. It was his own fucked up view of the world, but there wasn’t a man in the world more loyal to that view. I exploited it, and that made me leave the only family I’d ever really known. Until Summer, I was unfailingly loyal to them.
 

And then she came along. From day one, that spark of loyalty shifted over to her, even when I didn’t realize it at first. I began to see my “family” for what it was.
 

It was what it was—a fake family, a replacement for the one I lost a long time ago. It gave me enough of what I was looking for—a place to fit in, and with Cullen, a man who would always protect his own.
 

When I look at that woman and who she’s become, I see the future I never knew I wanted.
 

A wife—
my
wife. A child. That’s something I never thought of before I met her—and now when I look at her, I can’t help but think about knocking her up and growing old with her, children and grandchildren running around our feet for the rest of our lives. Something real, something that lasts forever—beyond all the death and pain and bullshit of ordinary life.

I lost all of it when I let her go, felt my heart ripping in two when I watched Damian tell her I didn’t love her, didn’t want her, and whatever other invented bullshit he spewed that day.
 

Summer Colington left
angry
, and even if I tell her that none of that shit was true, there are burdens and scars I know nothing about.

The way she looked at me today—I didn’t
just
see all the hurt of that day flooding back in, I also saw something far worse.

Grief, still present. A wound, broken open again. A far deeper pain simmering just below the surface.

It’s time to get to know that woman again--and to convince her that what I did was
right
. And it was the most painful thing I ever had to do.
 

There’s a whole goddamn bucket of secrets, too. But I’ll save that for when she at least
likes
me again.

Three Years, Four Months Ago

I
know
Ash followed me when I went home last night. I
know
he was watching when I yelled at the assholes to get away from our bar, and I know he sat outside watching us until it was well past dawn.
 

Any other man doing this kind of crap would have pissed me off. With Ash, it felt right somehow, like he’s supposed to make me feel safe.

Now I’m back at his door because he’s told me to be here.
 

I want him as much as I’ve ever wanted anything. I want him to save me, to make everything right.
 

I knock, and there’s no answer. My heart races.

“Ash? Ash? Goddammit!” I kick at his door. My voice cracks with anger and fear—anger at myself that I’m this pathetic one a man, and fear that he’s not in there because he’s been hurt. I’m a smart woman--and I realize it’s a defense mechanism. When he looks at me with those steely blue eyes, all of my education and reason and logic slip away. He makes me feel like a cavewoman, and something even deeper--something emotion. And I’m not used to that kind of shit. “Open up!”
 

What’s worse is that he looks at me when I spout off at him, all angry and hurt, and it’s like he can tell there’s something else there—like my anger
amuses
him and makes him want me more.
 

In fact, he’s said as much. And God help me, it turned me on
and
made me even angrier. If I’m willing to consider this kind of thing, and I’m not--really, I’m not—Ash gives me the sensation of falling over a cliff, dangling over the edge, unable to control what will happen next. My aunt always told me that’s what
love
feels like, and it pisses me off more that Ash is the one making me feel it.
 

At the thought, my whole body turns read—partly because he’s not answering the door, and partly because I thought about that word in conjunction with a mafia soldier whose only claim to fame is a few really sexy scars and some even sexier tattoos.
 

God. Dammit.

“Ash, if you don’t answer this door! I swear—”

The door opens, and Ash stands there totally shirtless, wearing only a beat up pair of jeans that seem to have holes in them in all the right places to make a red-blooded woman wonder what might happen if she slipped her hand right against that threadbare denim.

“What will you do, Sunshine? Will you huff and puff and blow down the door?” Before I have the wherewithal to respond, he steps forward and tangles his fingers in my hair. The lightest pressure against my scalp makes me shiver with anticipation, sending tendrils of warm desire to pool between my legs. I’m wet, right away, like he always makes me. When he kisses me, hands roaming over my breasts and somehow unhooking my bra without my knowledge, I forget what he got me to come here for. The text message was specific, wasn’t it?
 

We have something to talk about, Sunshine.
 

But what was it? Something about Cullen, something about the family, something about one of those things he always talks about.

But his lips are hot against mine, and he presses my body into the doorframe, pinning me. With aching slowness, he presses his cock against my thigh, thrusting gently.

“What if the neighbors see?”
 

He shrugs and cups my breast, squeezing my nipple gently. “They won’t, but if it makes you more comfortable—” He pulls me into his freakishly neat apartment and closes the door behind us, pushing me against the wall and kissing the tender skin of my neck. Chills run through me, but it feels like we had something important to talk about--a plan--something about protecting me, protecting my aunt.
 

Christ, I barely even absorbed the text message he sent me then. I was so pressed to get over here, I couldn’t do anything but
obey
when he told me to come.
 

“Hey—Ash—you had something to tell me—” He slips his hand in my jeans and I gasp. For a moment, I let him touch me, and then I remove his hand and push him away very gently. “Ash. There’s plenty of time for this kind of thing.”

“No time like the present.” Still, he keeps his hands off of me, even though I can feel the tension sparking between us.

I gulp, and my body feels like it might flutter away. Whatever he brought me here to tell me, he’s deflecting. He looks down and then cocks his head to the side and watches me.
 

“You know how I said Cullen is dangerous?”

I cross my arms. Not this again. That old Irish coot seems plenty ornery, but he hasn’t done anything
yet
. “Aunt B said he wouldn’t hurt us. She said they were old friends, that they had an understanding.”
 

“I think she might have her head mixed up about that.” He sighs and tries to pull me in again.
 

“We’ll get to the other stuff--a little later,” I say impatiently. He smiles at me and ushers me over to the sofa, depositing a glass of water on his plain brown--and totally spotless--coffee table. There’s a white napkin beneath the glass. I have the passing thought that if I looked under all the furniture, I’d see those little felt furniture pads from Home Depot. Just like the coffee table, the hardwood floor doesn’t have a scratch on it. I take a sip of the water and watch Jonathan Ash as he sits down across from me. “So, what’s this about? And why is your boss suddenly so dangerous? Last week he was just having us watched. And that made me plenty nervous--but my aunt took it all in stride, like it’s happened before.”

“It has,” he says, nodding. “And Cullen’s been willing to let a lot of things slide with Bianca. I think they used to be--“ Ash waves his hands and searches for the proper word. “Lovers.”
 

I make a face, and my stomach churns. “That’s just... gross. Oh God.” I cover my mouth and then talk through my fingers. “He wouldn’t hurt an old... girlfriend, right?”

“He’ll do what it takes to take Hell’s Kitchen for his own. That includes killing an old lover—”

“Stop saying the word ‘lover,’” I snap. “It’s making me physically ill.” My heart starts beating fast. Somehow it seems
worse
that there’s a real story between Bianca and Cullen. It seems
more
dangerous, even though it would be reasonable to assume that any sane man would leave his ex alone. But Cullen’s not sane, not fully. No criminal like that truly is.
 

“Whatever. Girlfriend,” Ash says. He gets up and pours himself a glass of whiskey from his immaculate bar and takes a few sips, watching me all the while. It looks like he’s gritting his teeth, like he’d rather not be saying what he’s about to say. “My job is—my job is complicated. I’m mostly just muscle, but I know what Cullen’s dirty work involves. Two nights ago, Cullen took the wife and daughter of the guy who owns the gambling club that’s next to Cullen’s bar. He wouldn’t pay up in time, wouldn’t let Cullen control him.” He pauses and sits back down. “The wife and daughter are now missing. I’m not really sure what that means—but I know it’s not good. Sometimes Cullen injures, sometimes worse.”

My mouth tastes salty and metallic all at once, and my throat constricts so that it feels difficult to breathe. “A woman—and a child—”

“Yeah.” Ash sighs heavily, like there’s a great weight sitting on his shoulders. “He’s always been an asshole. But he feels like he’s getting old, and he is. He wants to establish the stronghold here for the Family. He has nephews, no kids of his own. He feels like their his heirs, and Hell’s Kitchen is his legacy.”
 

“What the fuck.” I kind of start shaking, and the water spills out of my hands. Ash watches the drops fall on the floor like he might come over and start cleaning them up. But thank God, he resists. There needs to be one thing that’s normal today, and Mr. OCD will probably not help my mood. “He’s psychotic. He is
literally
psychotic.”
 

Ash crosses one leg over the other like men do on the subway in New York, spreading out and taking up space. That’s the kind of man he is—but for some reason, when he does it, there’s such a simple strength to his gesture, like he’s got everything figured out.
 

“He’s dedicated to his family,” Ash says, lacing his fingers together. “Before Cullen, the Family was ruthless—they’d kill anyone that got in their way. But if you’re Cullen’s blood, you’re protected. No exceptions.”

“And you’re his blood, I take it? You and every other ginger Irish man in the tri-state area?”

“Fuck no, I’m not related to that bastard. But he and my father were blood brothers. Cullen basically won me in a bet with my dad. I tried to get out of it by gambling with Cullen myself, but that fucking bastard beat me six ways from Sunday. Now I’m as good as blood. I grew up with his nephews, and I ran around his house from the time I could walk. And I took the blood pact when I turned eighteen—”

“Please, spare me the details on that one, will you?”